Hey, Tea Party: “It’s Not Your Country Anymore”

“It’s the Tea Party and the thinking of the Tea
Party and people like that that are driving the Republicans out of contention
as a national party. You cannot win nationally if you don’t know something
about the way the country’s changed, and the Tea Party seems to think the
country can go back 25 or 30 years. The greatest slogan that I hated during
this last campaign was ‘We want to take back our country.’ Guys, it’s not your
country anymore. It’s our country, and you’re part of it, but that thinking is
going to defeat Republicans nationally if they don’t get rid of it.”— ABC’s Sam Donaldson on The Chris Matthews Show,
December 23.

Blaming Egregiously “Extreme” Conservatives for
Fiscal Cliff Fiasco

“When Ronald Reagan was President, Grover Norquist
was in diapers and Rush Limbaugh was a disc jockey, I think, in St. Louis. You have had a
hermetically-sealed culture grow up on the right in this country that, as we
saw during the last election, is removed from reality and is extreme in the
most egregious way.”— Time magazine’s Joe Klein on CBS’s Face the
Nation, December 30.

Exploiting Tragedy to Push Liberal Gun-Control
Agenda

“Mental health is a secondary issue. We need to get
guns and bullets and automatic weapons off the streets. They should only be
available to police officers and to hunt al Qaeda and the Taliban and not hunt
elementary school children.”— CNN anchor Don Lemon on CNN Newsroom, December
17. [MP3 audio (1:09)]

“This change of heart, how sustainable is it? Will
it lead to meaningful action, and is meaningful action a ban on assault weapons
and more?...Is it now time to stand up to the NRA and to say to them — as Mayor
Bloomberg has said — ‘you are full of’ — we have the courage to take them on
now?”— CBS This Morning co-host Charlie Rose to Chicago
Mayor Rahm Emanuel, December 18.

CNN Savages “Unbelievably Stupid” Gun Rights
Advocates

Gun Owners of America executive director Larry
Pratt: “I honestly don’t understand why you would rather have people be victims
of a crime than be able to defend themselves. It’s incomprehensible.”CNN host Piers Morgan: “You’re an unbelievably
stupid man, aren’t you?...You have absolutely no coherent argument
whatsoever....You don’t give a damn, do you, about the gun murder rate in America?...I know why sales of
these weapons have been soaring in the last few days. It’s down to idiots like
you. Mr. Pratt.... You are a dangerous man espousing dangerous nonsense. And
you shame your country.— From the imported British host’s anti-gun tirade
on CNN’s Piers Morgan Tonight, December 18.

“You said it’s time to get rid of gun laws, like
the takeaway for you from this massacre at an elementary school is it’s time to
get rid of gun laws. How does that possibly make sense to you?...How you can
say that people should have fewer laws, and not more, I think is — it just
boggles the mind, honestly, and if you were to come here and talk to the people
in this town [of Newtown], they’d be stunned by you....I appreciate you talking
with me this morning, but I just — I have to say, your position — your position
completely boggles me, honestly. I just do not understand it.”— Anchor Soledad O’Brien to economist and author
John Lott on CNN’s Starting Point, December 17. [MP3 audio (0:46)]

Doesn’t the NRA Really Want More Mass Shootings?

“NRA membership booms in these moments. Gun sales
boom in these moments. Bushmaster [rifle] sales are booming. In the wake of the
Gabby Giffords shooting, Glocks boomed. So in a perverse way — they would never
admit this publicly — but in a perverse way, these moments are actually good
for them. So then, how do we expect them to really not want these moments?”— Co-host Touré on MSNBC’s The Cycle, December 20.[MP3 audio (0:58)]

Piers Morgan vs. The NRA’s “Murderous Crap”

“The one
guaranteed outcome of Wayne Lapierre’s press conference: U.S. gun sales will soar even
higher in next few days. #NRA #DeadlySpiral” “This is
your moment, America: The #NRA has 4 million
members, your population is 311 million. Don’t stand for this murderous crap
any more. “Coming to
a town near you, courtesy of the #NRA - Gunfights At The U.S. School Corral.”— Succession of Twitter messages posted by CNN’s
Piers Morgan during a press conference by the NRA’s Wayne LaPierre, December 21.
(Spelling and grammar as in the original.)

End Violence by Dragging GOP Leaders Around a
Parking Lot?

“I would tie Mitch McConnell and John Boehner, our
esteemed Republican leaders, to the back of a Chevy pickup truck and drag them
around a parking lot until they saw the light on gun control.”— Des Moines Register columnist Donald Kaul,
December 29.

Susan Rice: “Victim” of Conservative Media

“It [criticism of Susan Rice] was all driven, in
many cases, by some conservative outlets who were making her the center of the
Benghazi story....She sort of became a victim of this....You can become
collateral damage in a hurry in just the way you can get piled on, whether it’s
Twitter, whether it’s advocacy journalism, whatever you want to describe it,
talk radio. And that’s what she was. She became political collateral damage.”— NBC News political director Chuck Todd during
live MSNBC coverage on December 13, after Rice withdrew her name as a potential
Secretary of State.[MP3 audio (0:51)]

The “Unbearable” Thought of Losing Hillary

“The idea of losing Hillary has seemed especially
unbearable at this political moment. It’s as if she has become, literally, the
ship of state. She stands for maturity, tenacity, and self-discipline at a time
when everyone else in Washington seems to be, in more
senses than one, going off a cliff—a parade of bickering, blustering,
small-balled hacks bollixing up the nation’s business. She’s a caring executive
too, and that takes its own emotional toll. What a disgrace that John Bolton
and his goaty Republican ilk accused Her Magnificence of inventing a concussion
to get out of testifying at the Benghazi hearings. Bolton is not fit to wipe her
floor with his mustache.”— Newsweek/Daily Beast editor Tina Brown in a
January 2 Web article.

Seeing Urgent Need to Get Abortion “Back on Track”

“This month will mark the 40th anniversary of the
Supreme Court’s landmark Roe v. Wade decision, which legalized abortion in this
country. But this week’s Time magazine cover story argues that activists have
been losing that fight over abortion rights ever since that historic
ruling....Kate, what do you think it’s going to take to get abortion rights
back on track and not deny it from those who need it?”— MSNBC fill-in anchor Alex Witt to Time staff
writer Kate Pickert on NewsNation, January 3.

Stressed Out by the “Religion Part” of Christmas

“I don’t like the religion part. I think religion
is what mucks the whole thing up....I don’t like the religion part. I think
that’s what makes the holidays so stressful and — I don’t.”— NBC chief medical editor Nancy Snyderman talking about
Christmas during a “Today’s Professionals” panel segment on Today, December 11.

Media Were Too Pro-Republican in 2012?

“Did you get the impression during the presidential
campaign that the press was trying too hard to be even-handed? Did you think
the people delivering the news were pushing what we call ‘balance’ at the
expense of the obvious facts, that the day-to-day stories never got across the
obvious big fact, that the Democrats in this election were like Democrats going
back to Jack Kennedy, but the Republicans were far to the right of anything
we’ve seen from that party ever?...It was the truth that dared not be reported
in the mainstream media.”— MSNBC’s Chris Matthews on Hardball, December 12.[MP3 audio (1:09)]

Nasty GOP Taking Food from Poor to Pay for Tax Cuts

“Good evening. We begin tonight with our big story,
the reality of an estimated 46 million Americans. Simply put, they can’t afford
to eat. They live off food stamps. These are men, women and children in America. Hunger is not just a
third world problem. It’s a massive problem right here in the United States
right now.... (to GOP consultant Kristen Soltis) Do you feel comfortable that
the Republicans are prepared to slash investment into something like food
stamps in an effort to try and protect — as it seems to many people — the
wealthiest two percent from paying more tax?”— Host Piers Morgan on CNN’s Piers Morgan Tonight,
December 7.

Democrats Delivered “Payback” to “Arch
Conservative” Bork

“Remember Robert Bork? He first came to fame in
1973 when he was the U.S. Solicitor General. Bork carried out President Nixon’s
so-called ‘Saturday Night Massacre,’ firing the Watergate special prosecutor.
Payback came when President Reagan nominated Bork to the Supreme Court. The
Democratically-controlled Senate rejected the arch conservative after one of
the most contentious confirmation hearings ever.”— Anchor Scott Pelley noting Bork’s passing on the
December 19 CBS Evening News.

Wondering How the Obamas Get It On

“Mr. President, Mrs. Obama. There is a photograph
of you [hugging] that went viral, became the most shared photograph in the
history of Twitter. How do you keep the fire going?”— Barbara Walters to the Obamas in an interview
excerpt shown on ABC’s World News and Nightline, December 26.[MP3 audio (1:53)]

Chris Matthews, a “Statesman...At the Peak of His
Game”

“He’s as good as he’s ever been. He’s at a place in
his life where he’s really comfortable in his own skin. He’s a statesman. He
has so much knowledge and I think he understands it better. He’s always been
great, but I really think he’s been at the peak of his game.”— MSNBC President Phil Griffin as quoted by
Associated Press media writer Dave Bauder in a December 27 item about Matthews,
“the broadcaster that conservatives love to hate.”

Next Year, No More Pretending to “Support the
Troops”

“Stop saying, ‘I support the troops.’ I don’t. I
used to....But at some point all individuals must answer for their actions, and
now that we know our military leaders do things that have nothing to do with
defending our lives, why would anyone sign up for this rogue organization?”— Left-wing filmmaker Michael Moore announcing his
New Year’s resolutions in a December 31 article published by the Huffington
Post.

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